Posted by Alex C on December 25, 2002 at 23:38:14:
In Reply to: Re: A Christmas wish for Holton . . . posted by Rick Denney on December 25, 2002 at 14:13:15:
My experience leads me to believe that "old craftsmanship" was ever an issue. I also agree that Holton never understood what made one tuba better than the other. I do believe that Pop Johnson (who designed the Yorks) did but it's only an opinion.
When I went to the factory to pick out my instrument, they had two to pick from. A tuba player from a nearby full time orchestra came to Elkhorn to check out the two horns at the same time.
We both thought that there was a world of difference between the two tubas... INCLUDING a 2" height difference! When I asked the factory rep, he told me that they built those horns so infrequently that they "forgot how" between assignments.
Except for the bell-spiner, not one of the other people involved in the manufacture of these two horns had build one before. Oh, the engraver had engraved several others. The facotry's approach was: if you mount the right parts on the jig and solder them together, it'll work.
Keep in mind that one of these horns was intended for Arnold Jacobs, who was my teacher. They had to be doing their best work. We couldn't decide which one it was, they both had good and bad points. I took the one with the best low register.
I pursued the factory managers for years to make a dozen of these instruments at one time, to compete with the Hirsbrunners which were selling at twice the LIST price of Holtons. The Elkhorn factory manager told me then, that if they sold CC tubas list price they would still loose money. No more big tubas. Ever. Period. Purely a financial, if short sighted, decision on their part.
The old Holtons are not as refined as the two Yorks are, but there's certainly a lot of potential in all of them.
My opinion is that the newer versions of these horns have more refinement but not as much sound potential, for the most part. I like the old Holtons but you had to be a top notch player in top shape to play them well.